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I would like VW to create a FROST or SOFT FOCUS function for the Spotlight Instrument tool. This would help visualise the effect of varying grades of frost filter and would be especially helpful when rendering shutters cuts and gobos that need to have a soft focus applied. Could I suggest Rosco 132, Rosco 119, and Rosco 114 as a good start.
Many thanks
Mark

Hello,
I have a mayor problem which I just discovered in the Spotlight module.
When I select a random lighting instrument and select "Edit" and perform a random edit, VW crashes immediately.
This happens on all the Mac's we use VW on.
Also we discovered an issue with Inserting Lighting Positions, this feature is not working properly anymore.
I would appreciate a quick reaction on these issues !!
Pelle Herfst
Lighting Designer
Westerdoksdijk 679
NL 1013 BX Amsterdam
The Netherlands-EEC
T: +31 20 62 06 212
M: +31 6 53 15 18 77
E: pelle@rapenburgplaza.nl
W: www.rapenburgplaza.com

I'd like to request a plugin tool to create cable swags. Sometimes you want to show the crew where their cable swags should drop off.
Step 1: draw a line
Step 2: choose the start height and end height.
Step 3: choose how much swag or droop to have
Optional: Maybe the tool can calculate how much cable is in that run.

I am trying to create a custom house light fixture, it's an Altman Downlight Chalice. I have imported the .dwg of it, converted it into a lighting lighting symbol. Now I want to use the Photometrics file that Altman provides which is an .ies file. I have looked all over and cannot find a way to import and assign that to a custom fixture.
Anybody have any ideas? Or am I looking at this totally wrong?

Noticed that my lighting fixtures (spotlight - theatrical symbols - all custom) keep disappearing when I zoom. I thought maybe there was a scale discrepancy, but after checking that and checking to make sure that my class and layer options are all correct, I started futzing with the Fixture Mode dropdown. When I am able to select the fixtures, even if their fixture mode is already set to none, if I grab that dropdown menu and set them to none again, suddenly they don't disappear. This is true across the board, no matter what symbol or what fixture mode. Setting them to none makes them all stay.
Edit: Day 2 - I have to do this once every time I open the file. And it seems that syncing with Lightwright also makes me have to do this again.
Running VW2017
2012 Macbook Pro
OS X El Capitan
VW 10.11.6
2.6 GHZ Intel Core i7
16 GB 1600 MHz DDR3 Ram
NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1024 MB

Hello all,
I am looking for a way to make a custom sized truss with 3 sides containing ladder bars and one side open.
This is an example of what I mean: http://www.tomcatglobal.com/Products/Dance-Tower/
Any suggestions on how to do this?
Thank you!

When attempting to label fixtures using the label legend the properties selected are not stored.
Once properties are selected under the edit fields prompt, I attempt to apply them to a symbol (edit layout) and there is nothing to layout.
When entering the dialog again, there are none of the previously selected fields still selected.
Whats up with this!

Hey VW Friends,
working on rending some 3d shots of a design we are working on for a project and i'm not sure what i'm doing wrong. any time i try fast or final render works i just get a solid colour Crop. but yet in open GL i can see my full shot, what is also interesting is in Open GL not all my lights turn on, yet they are all duplicated from the first one thats turned on. for my final render work i figured it could also be my Ambient lighting was too dark at 12% so i upped it to 75% and all i got was a more Brown Screen instead of black, i attached that screenshot too.
I guess i'm trying to figure out the best render settings for presenting my projects that all the lights are on and i have a nice dark ambient lighting,
Thanks in advanced VW Friends.
Andrew
Total Events

I have placed a lighting instrument (S4) on a light position using the spotlight instrument insertion tool For some reason, the instrument appears beneath the lighting position and is faded (looks like it's grayed). As far as I can tell, everything about the instrument is ok, it just doesn't display properly. I earlier inserted some instruments and these all display fine; they are full brightness and on top of the pipe. I can copy these older instruments onto a pipe and they work fine when copied. However, the instruments inserted by selecting an instrument in the resource browser and inserting it don't display correctly. What did I do that makes these instruments dim? When I click on the ones that display correctly and the ones that don't, I cannot see any difference in the object info. They are both on the lighting position, they both have their fields filled in, etc. They are both on the same layer and class, although the new one looks like it's on a grayed layer. I tried send to front and it didn't help. Both the instrument and its data are grayed.

Every time a screen gets dropped in one of our drawings, we need to know the optical center of the screen to optimize the projection scaffolding setup. It would be outstanding if the OIP of the screen object would just tell you what that measurement was instead of having to draw a 3D dimension in a front elevation (which can be a chore in and of itself) or worse yet, having to actually do foot and inch math in your head!
The way I see it, the plugin is already calculating the center of the screen, because the projector position can be set to "Screen Center." All we need is an entry showing what that dimension is!
Thanks,
Joel

Hi,
I have a clean install of Vectorworks Spotlight 2017 SP2. I have used the straight Truss tool to create a Lighting Position. This worked fine initially. Now when I change the z height of the truss the truss dissapears, in 3d and in Top/Plan view. I don't understand what is going on here. Any help much appreciated. See attached files for details.
diappearing_truss.mp4
benlight_demo_show01A.vwx

Hi All,
So I started experimenting with adding movement circles into the 3D component of my Lighting Devices. These are circle objects with a dashed line type, flipped up into the appropriate 3d space. They are great for 3d sections I've been generating.
However, it appears that these 2d objects do not move appropriately when Set 3d Orientation is used. The circles are grouped appropriately inside the symbol with the appropriate Part and so forth, so I do not think it is built incorrectly. Furthermore, as soon as I convert the circle to a 3D Poly and refresh instruments, it immediately moves to the correct location. This is less than, because then I cannot easily make it a dashed line type.
Thoughts?
Thanks,
Ben

I have one resource library in my Resource Browser favorites that is displaying duplicate folders in the hierarchy structure.
Any explanation to why it does this?
Clicking on both folders takes me to the same correct folder.
Thanks.
C

I would like the ability to add multiple "typical" to the Lighting Instrument Summary.
Not sure if others practice this method, but my different device types will sometimes use different Label Legends.
Being able to name each typical to its specific device type would also be great!
Allowing the user to add additional "typical" horizontally or vertically would be nice too.
Jeff Miller

Hello!
My name is Nik Robalino and I'm selling my Vectorworks license with Spotlight (includes Renderworks). I am getting out of the industry and no longer have a use for it. I am asking for $2,650.
Thanks for your interest,
Nik

I keep having issues when using the Lighting Instrument insert tool. When I click on the insert light device tool icon in the spotlight palette. After clicking on the icon and then moving to the drop down panel to select a lighting instrument. The programs seems to freeze and lock up on all of my projects. So that I cant get any work done. I have found a work around by navigating to the symbols in the Resource browser. Does anyone else have this issue!

I'm trying to adjust the shutter on an ETC Source 4 19deg and whenever I click "OK", Vectorworks immediately crashes. Same response when trying to evenly space fixtures on a pipe (an issue I know is already known). Any input here?

After doing several viewport FQR updates. The screens and any texture that is assigned glow, seems to do this weird inverted thing color thing. This has happened in multiple files, fresh ones, and older ones. Anyone else run in to this? Is it a bug? Restarting VW fixes the problem for a handful more renders.
Vectorworks 2017 SP2. Machine spec's in the screen shot below.

I have a file on spotlight in which, being used to the workings of AutoCAD, I simply set up a 24x36 rectangle and drafted in 1/4" scale in that, since this was my first time using this program. Now that I want to export, I can't seem to get it within the sheet layer. Is there a quick and easy way to get the sheet layer to contain what I drew, or do I have to alter a lot? Also, is there an easy way to change my title block, drawn just in a design layer instead of sheet layer, to the regular format of a title block? If it helps, I have attached the file in question, in vectorworks 2017 format.
Beauty_and_the_Beast_Plot.vwx

I have a file that I have drafted in 1/4" scale that I'd like to scale up to 1:1, since it would be easier to manipulate. Is there an easy way to do this without messing up the dimensions of my drawing?
Beauty_and_the_Beast_Plot.vwx

I am unfamiliar with this forum and how it works, but I have a persistent issue for which I am seeking help. For the past 3 versions of VW (2012, 2015 and now 2017, running on Mac OSX, now ver. 10.11.6), my Spotlight toolbox shows a red "X" where the Curtain Object tool ought to be, which gives me an error message. Any idea what I need to do to recover that tool? Here is the message I get:
An error occurred while opening the plug-in. Make sure that the plugin is located in the "Plug-ins" folder located in the User Data and Preferences Folder. See Vectorworks Preferences - User Folders tab.
I don't know what I am supposed to do in the Preferences - User Folders tab, and I cannot locate the plugin in any of the "Plug-ins" folders. Other plug-ins seem to be fine. Any help is appreciated!

I'm using VW2016 Spotlight Site Protection Network Ver. (Japanese:サイトプロテクションネットワーク版) on new released MacBook Pro w/o TouchBar.
It is so heavy behavior, pan, input text, and all movement does not move as I want.
I Installed SP6, but not changed there symptom.
I'm think of problem of Hardware, but browsing website etc other behavior is not late.
Have I that solution?
Using Laptop : MacBook Pro 2016(without TouchBar)
OS Version : OS X Sierra(10.12.2)
VW Version : 2016 SP6 Japanese Edition
Memory and SSD is normal.
Using Windows 10 in BootCamp.
Running VW2016 in Macintosh.
Thanks.

I'm not sure if this has come up before, but I would love to see a change to the way fixtures with zoom ranges are handled. Right now we can only input the x and y beam and field spreads for a fixture, but we cannot designate a smallest zoom size and largest zoom size. I cannot tell Vectorworks that my Source Four 25-50 zoom fixture has a minimum field size of 25 degrees and a max of 50, then when I place the fixture choose where in that zoom range I want the beam size set. Ideally VW would also do the basic math on the Candlepower and be able to do the math on the inverse square calculations of what happens to beam intensity when you flood.
Thoughts?